


Swimming Across a River So Deep

by tigs



Category: Bandom, Panic At The Disco
Genre: College!AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-13
Updated: 2008-12-13
Packaged: 2017-10-02 23:58:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tigs/pseuds/tigs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Ryan tells the story, though, he begins it here: with a photograph, a meeting, an unwilling smile.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Swimming Across a River So Deep

It should be noted, perhaps, that the story truly begins here:

When Ryan leaves Las Vegas that first August, all of his necessary possessions in two large suitcases and three boxes that are probably somewhere in Nebraska right now, he has no intention of coming back permanently, ever. He is leaving, he is gone, it is fact.

Indeed, when he gets settled in Chicago, he knows that he's made the right choice. He relishes that first Chicago snow (and even the seventh) and loves the fact that for five whole months out of the year (at the very least), his scarves and gloves are necessities rather than accessories.

Yes, he may grumble when Pete drags him out for coffee at midnight, or when Pete or William or Gabe drag him to shows, but over that first Christmas break, when he tells Spencer and Brendon everything that he's been doing, his lips twitch upwards into a slight smile when Brendon stares at him with wide eyes and says, "Ryan Ross, you have actually become _social_."

All of which is to say, perhaps no one is as surprised as Ryan is when one night midway through his sophomore year, as he's talking with Spencer on the phone, he says, "When I move back home--"

He stops talking immediately, bites his tongue, and laughs along when Spencer says, "You? Move home? Since when? What happened to driving away and never looking back?" He sounds disbelieving, and maybe he is.

It's quite possible, after all, that Ryan's just suffering a momentary bout of homesickness, brought on by hearing about Spencer and Brendon's spontaneous middle of the night drive to Los Angeles the weekend before, the one that Brendon claims was just 'so fucking fun, Ross, you have no idea'. Or maybe it's just a slip of the tongue, because Vegas was home for years and years, and will always, in some way, be home.

Or maybe it's because, as much as Ryan doesn't want to admit it, there are times when he closes his eyes, loses himself in a moment, and if he isn't thinking _Chicago, Chicago_ when he breathes in, the air tastes wrong on his tongue.

Whatever the reason is, though, from that point on the idea grows, becomes fact.

When Ryan moves back, they'll get an apartment. When Ryan moves back, he'll get his MFA from UNLV, Spencer will start working towards his MBA. They'll get a band together, something that appeals to the creative writing-business major set. Brendon will play guitar, or maybe bass, something. It'll be just like the Good Ol' Days, Brendon says, or at least the days that were good.

It's the way things are going to be. Of that, Ryan has no doubt.

*

If Pete is the one to start telling the story--as he likes to do, because he is Pete Wentz--he begins it here:

When Ryan was just a wee tyke--

"Or fourteen, you fucker," Ryan says.

\--he apparently wrote down a list of things that he was going to accomplish before he turned 25. This list included such original items as 'be in a band that lasts longer than one summer' and 'write the Great American Novel' and 'make out with some girl, what's-her-name, who eventually became the prom queen'.

"At which point I thought better of it," Ryan says.

The point, though, is that being the editor of _The Euphony_, one of the University of Chicago's literary magazines, apparently never even came close to making his list. What the hell, right? It should have been totally obvious to _anyone_ that it'd always been Ryan's fucking, like, calling in life to be editor-in-chief of the esteemed publication.

"Because it's true!" Pete says, and that is usually when Ryan breaks in, tries to take over. Sometimes Pete lets him. Then again, sometimes he doesn't.

See, for three years, ever since Pete first met Ryan during Ryan's freshman orientation, Pete's pretty much been grooming Ryan to take over the Wentz Literary Empire. It's not like it's a fucking secret or anything, and _most people_, Ross, would be totally grateful for the opportunity, okay? But sometimes Ryan, because he's an ungrateful brat, will, like, try to fucking blame Pete for taking him under his fucking wing or something.

Like, Ryan totally fucking grumbles at Pete for dragging him to clubs four nights a week to hear Pete's (and now Ryan's) many, many friends in bands play. He'll claim that his classes are far too early the next morning for him to be out so late, despite the fact that _everyone_ knows that the whole point of college is to learn to survive on fucking, like, five hours of sleep a night or less. Or, when Pete tries to corral him into, like, art nights with him and Travis--the ones where they'll spend fucking hours throwing paint at pieces of paper in occasionally planned patterns--Ryan'll try to beg off because of, like, having to read a fucking Greek play or some such shit. Seriously.

The thing is, though, if Pete's to blame for getting Ryan out and about and social, then Pete's totally to blame for Jon, too.

Ryan always tries to roll his eyes at Pete when Pete says that, but it's half-hearted, like he just can't seem to be able to bring himself to. Once, though, he nods, at which point Pete says, satisfied, "Yeah, you fucking know it."

*

When Jon's the one to tell the story, he usually says:

Once upon a time there was a boy, a very, very good boy named Jon, and he grew up in the kingdom of Chicago. He was happy growing up, or at least he thought he was, and then one day, when he was old enough, he left home and moved to the great center of learning, the University of Chicago. It was there, during his third year, that he met a boy named Ryan. Did I mention that the boy named Jon was very, very good? Because he must have been, to get _that_ as a reward.

Usually around that time, Jon breaks off telling the story and reaches over to squeeze Ryan's hand, or possibly to kiss him.

To be honest, that's usually where Jon ends the story, too.

*

When Ryan tells the story, though, he begins it here: with a photograph, a meeting, an unwilling smile.

See, the staff of _The Euphony_ meets in Harper 141 on Thursday evenings twice a month, and when Pete calls this particular meeting to order, he says, "You may notice that we have a stranger in our midst tonight--okay, that's a lie, he's not a stranger. You all know Jon Walker, right?"

Ryland says, "Yo," and William says, "Jonny boy, welcome, welcome." And while everyone else in the room seems to know this Jon, Ryan is pretty sure he doesn't. He looks familiar, more than familiar, but Ryan's relatively sure they've never been introduced.

Pete continues, "Right, good. Well, Jon Walker has been assigned to do our quarter of a page for the yearbook this year, because Euphonics have got to fucking represent, right? Damn right."

"Damn right," Nate echoes, as Pete keeps talking. "So, I don't know, where do you want us, Walker? Clustered around the whiteboard? Looking literary magazine-y?"

"Sounds awesome," Jon says, and after that there's movement: chair legs scraping over linoleum floors, desks moving forward, knocking corners against each other. Ryan rolls his eyes during the third minute of Pete trying to get them all arranged in front of the whiteboard to his liking, then blushes a little when Jon rolls his own eyes in imitation.

After that, though, it moves quickly.

"Smile," Jon says, and Ryan quirks his lips upwards, more smile than he usually gives to cameras.

Jon takes four group pictures in total, all of which are relatively painless, but then Pete hands out the submissions for them to look at, and Jon doesn't leave. Instead he stays, taking candid shots. Several of Pete. A few of William. More of Ryland and Alex. Then, finally, he crouches down in front of the desk that Ryan's staked out for his own. He's wearing flip-flops, Ryan sees, despite the fact that it's October.

"I don't think we've officially met," Jon says, holding out his hand. He's leaning forward, elbow balanced on Ryan's desk. "Jon Walker."

"Ryan Ross," Ryan says, gingerly taking Jon's hand in his own. Jon squeezes into the handshake, letting his fingers linger longer than Ryan's used to, in a way that pings something in the back of Ryan's head.

"So, Ryan Ross," Jon says, finally, his grin soft. "Can I take your picture?"

He holds his camera up, as if in illustration, as if he hasn't been doing just that for the last fifteen minutes, and Ryan wants to say no, he has every reason to say no--namely, he avoids pictures if at all possible at all costs. He opens his mouth to say, 'no.'

"Yes," he says.

Jon's grin turns blinding. "Smile," he says.

Ryan does.

 

*

The first time Ryan starts telling the story to Spencer (way back at the beginning, when there's barely any story to tell) he says, "We have nothing in common."

This was three weeks after the first official meeting, two days before the first date, a week and a half after Jon realized that they were in the same Astronomy 101 class, and the same day he sat down next to Ryan and said, "So, what would you say to getting dinner this weekend? The two of us?"

His gaze was soft in that way that made sweat start prickling on the palms of Ryan's hands, just a little, and his breath catch in his throat. Ryan actually had to swallow before he could nod, say, "Um. Yeah. We could do that?"

"Absolutely _nothing_ in common," Ryan says again, and he's sure that it's true. Caught breath and sweaty palms aside, they have what? A photograph? Astronomy 101 with their 150 nearest and dearest friends? As far as Ryan's concerned, those are not the sorts of things that provide a solid foundation for a friendship, much less anything more. And Ryan still doesn't get why Jon seems to want to sit next to him every day, much less take him out to dinner.

"I only said yes," Ryan tells Spencer, "because he knows Pete, but he's not Pete, or you, or Brendon, and what are we even going to talk about? We'll have nothing to say to each other."

Except, as Ryan discovers on date number one, they do. They have music.

They go to a piano bar that Patrick has mentioned on more than one occasion, and as Jon leads them to a table in the corner, Ryan's a little concerned that he's going to be listening to jazz or blues all night--not that there's anything wrong with that, but he prefers his jazz and blues in small doses.

Fifteen minutes after they sit down, however, the pianist starts to play. Green Day, 2Pac, the Beatles, an eclectic set, his fingers quick and light, with edges to the notes that Ryan's rarely heard coaxed out of a keyboard before. Jon sings what words he knows to the songs softly in Ryan's ear.

"My friend Tom and I," Jon says afterwards, as they walk back to Ryan's apartment, back to where Jon's car is parked, "we were in a band together, once upon a time. That's where I first met Pete and Patrick actually. We were part of the same scene."

"My band," Ryan says, and then he stops, because he hasn't talked about The Summer League in… months, and it's been longer still since he mentioned it to anyone who wasn't Spencer, Brendon, or Brent. He twists the edge of his scarf in his fingers, braiding a few of the tassel strings together. "We never actually played a show, but we thought we were pretty good. We started out as a Blink cover band--" He rushes the first words, says the last hesitantly, in case Jon decides to laugh at him, but Jon's just grinning, looking like he thinks it's rather adorable.

Ryan would blush, if he wasn't already ducking his head, staring at the ground.

*

It's after date four--impromptu, dinner after their Astronomy class, then a trip to _Borders_ to wander the aisles and read the backs of romance novels in dramatic voices--that Ryan shows Jon one of his old notebooks filled with lyrics. Songs he wrote for The Summer League, for the band they were talking about becoming after that. Some of the pages only Spencer has ever seen.

Jon sits on Ryan's bed, toes buried in Ryan's quilt, back against the wall, and Ryan tries not to fidget. His palms are sweating and he keeps fingering the hem of his shirt, wishing he was still wearing his scarf so that he could be tying it in knots. He lets his breath out, finally, when Jon says, "Did you ever write music for any of these? I can almost hear some of it in my head, you know? The rhythm is just--"

Ryan's feeling a little bit shaky still when he nods, holds out a carefully steadied hand, and says, "We started laying out chords for that one--" he points to the one he always referred to as 'Build God' in his head, then at the one that Brendon dubbed the 'tacks' song, "and that one."

"Do you still remember any of it?" Jon asks, looking genuinely interested, and Ryan means to start shaking his head, but as happens frequently when Jon is around, his brain seems to have other ideas, and all of a sudden he's nodding, getting up off the bed to pick up his guitar from the floor by the closet.

He spends a few minutes tuning, but then he takes a deep breath and actually starts to play. The notes sound hesitant at first, but they (and the words) are apparently ingrained in his memory, because he's singing, playing, remembering, and when he looks over at Jon, to try to tell what he's thinking, he sees that Jon has closed his eyes.

*

Ryan and Jon's fifth date isn't really a date at all.

More: it's Saturday morning and Jon has a paper due in his Art History 308 class on Monday, and Ryan has three books to read before his classes next week, so he says he'll go too.

When Ryan goes to the library by himself, he usually finds an alcove to curl up in, away from the sometimes not-so-quiet hum of people studying. Jon goes straight for a table on the main floor, though, out in the open, whispers echoing in the atrium around them, and when he asks, "Is this okay?" Ryan nods.

He nods because he expects Jon to want to talk.

Certainly, when Ryan goes to the library with Nate and his girlfriend, the two of them make what Ryan tells Spencer are 'sickeningly googly eyes' at one another and talk and whisper until Ryan is forced to either leave or put on his headphones.

Not that he's expecting Jon to want to do such a thing, but he's still surprised that Jon actually spends most of his time studying, only looking up to catch Ryan's eye occasionally. When he does, though, his smile is bright, stretching to his eyes, and his cheeks are slightly flushed, and Ryan doesn't want to look away.

During hour two, Jon reaches across the table and tugs Ryan's book from his hands. He flips to the first page, then the last, then reads part of the page that Ryan had been in the process of reading. He raises an eyebrow and asks, "Good?" Ryan shrugs, because it doesn't matter if it's good or not, he still has to read it and be ready to discuss it in class.

At the end of hour three, Jon stands up from the table and says, "Okay, the commons are calling my name. Food?" Then he holds out a hand for Ryan, which Ryan stares at for only a moment before taking it. Then Jon pulls Ryan up.

As they walk away from the table, Ryan loosens his fingers in anticipation of letting go. Jon doesn't.

*

And then, suddenly, Ryan and Jon (and occasionally Pete) aren't the only characters in the story anymore.

Because one night, a month and a half into this whole thing, after Ryan has stopped wondering if Jon's going to wake up and realize that Ryan is actually, you know, Ryan Ross and not whomever Jon thinks that Ryan is, they go over to William and Gabe's for a 'Fuck the New Quarter!' alcohol and ice cream social.

The whole group is there, everyone--Pete's crew, William and Gabe's groups, and at some point, Ryan finds himself sitting on the floor beneath the window, thumbing the strings of Ryland's guitar, just random notes. He doesn't feel like he's been sitting there for very long at all when Jon comes and sits down next to him, close, knees brushing.

His gaze is beer hazy and his breath is warm against Ryan's cheek when he says, "Think we can do a duet?"

Ryan blinks, but lets Jon pry his fingers off of the neck of the guitar, replacing them with his own.

"Pluck," Jon says, and Ryan does. He tries to watch Jon's fingers to get an idea of what he should be playing, but then he hears Jon murmuring chords under his breath. It only takes them a few stanzas or so to get a true melody going--jerky, unpracticed, but mostly recognizable, and then it gets easier, easier still.

When they trail off, Ryan hears the sound of applause, and when he looks up, he sees that everyone in the room is watching him, them. A moment later, Jon leans over to kiss him and Ryan doesn't really even register when Ryland comes over to take his guitar back again, at least not until he moves his hand to Jon's neck, cheek, and rubs his thumb across the stubble on Jon's chin.

Somewhere in the distance he hears Pete shouting encouragement and Ryan makes himself remove his hand from Jon's cheek long enough to flip Pete off.

*

Then there's Tom.

Ryan's met Tom before, of course.

_Of course_, because the more Ryan learns about Jon, the more surprised he is that they hadn't met before. Or, at the very least, that he hadn't truly registered Jon before, because he _knows_ that their paths must have crossed more than once before that true first meeting, what with the bands they both know, the shows they've both been to, the parties that William and Gabe have thrown over the years.

So, Ryan knows Tom, but there's a difference between seeing Tom across the room at one of those same parties and seeing him sitting on the couch in the apartment he shares with Jon when Ryan walks out of Jon's room in the morning.

Tom, Ryan decides, has a rather evil sort of smirk, complete with raised eyebrows and _leering_. Ryan does not approve of leering. Jon doesn't seem to notice anything odd, though, because when he walks out of the room, just a step behind Ryan, he just says, "'Morning, dick."

"Morning, Jane," Tom says, and then he laughs when Jon flips him off. Ryan doesn't know quite what to say, or whether he should say anything at all, but then Jon hands Ryan a cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee--black, two sugars--and says, "Tommy made a run this morning."

Tom raises his own cup in salute, so Ryan raises his own and says, "Thanks."

*

Then there's Brendon.

He calls Ryan once while Jon is over, lying stomach down on the floor of Ryan and Nate's living room, trying to beat Nate's high score on the classic Sonic. And Brendon's hearing is far too good, apparently, because as Ryan's telling him about the show that he went to earlier in the week, Jon's character dies it's final time and he says, "Oh, fuck you."

He says it quietly, but then Brendon's saying, "Is that Jon Walker I hear? Hand him the phone, Ryan Ross. Jon and I need to be talking about the sort of language he should be using in your presence."

"Fuck you," Ryan says, but it's fond enough that Jon gives him a curious look.

"Brendon," Ryan continues. "He'd like to talk to you."

Ryan almost expects Jon's eyes to widen, for him to say something along the lines of yeah, no, but instead he holds out his hand for the phone. When he puts it to his ear, Ryan hears Brendon saying, his voice tinny, "So _you're_ the elusive Jon Walker that I've been hearing about for months and months now."

It hasn't been that long, Ryan wants to say, but then he thinks about it, and… it has been. Months, plural, several of them, time slipping by without his even noticing, and when he notices Jon looking at him, a slight frown on his face, seeming almost worried, Ryan half-smiles. He rubs his toe against Jon's, which makes Jon laugh, makes Brendon ask, "What? What? Is Ryan making fun of me?" to which Jon says, "No, no, it's nothing. Now what were you saying?"

*

Later that night Ryan sits at his desk, staring at the calendar hanging on his wall.

This year, it's eighteen months worth of beagle puppies, an early birthday gift from Spencer, given to Ryan right before he got on the plane back to Chicago. The year before it was guitars, the year before that, famous quotations. When he was twelve, it was a Blink-182 concert calendar.

During high school, Ryan crossed out every day as it passed: counting down until he could leave for college, head for New York, San Francisco, Chicago. Until he could be anywhere but stuck in Nevada. Once, the year before, he'd actually counted out how many days he had left before he headed back there.

He's not quite sure when he stopped crossing the days out, but as he stares at the page hanging on the wall in front of him, at the picture of the beagle puppy in a flowerpot, the one surrounded on all sides by red rose petals, he's pretty sure that it was months ago, maybe two.

Maybe around the time Jon flipped through the calendar for the first time, ran a finger over a picture of a puppy in a half-carved pumpkin. He'd grinned at Ryan as he asked, "You that anxious to get out of here?"

Yes, probably around that time, Ryan thinks again.

This is what Ryan knows, though: before, he used to stare at the calendar for hours on end, day after day, but now there are some weeks when Ryan's pretty sure that he doesn't look at the calendar at all.

*

So, time passes.

Time passes, winter to spring, spring to summer, summer to fall, and Ryan gets used to Jon, the way that Jon slots into his life, the changed routine.

For instance, the third time that Ryan wakes up to the flash of a camera reflecting bright against the backs of his eyelids, he decides that he is really, really going to have to talk to Nate about leaving Jon in their apartment unattended.

Because Jon likes to take pictures of Ryan, see, and that is a problem.

Well, not so much the _taking_ part, as the fact that he likes to _develop_ said pictures and blow them up and hang them in his own apartment for _other_ people to admire. Which leads to people, people that Ryan doesn't even _know_, coming up to him and telling him that they've seen his picture, and wow, Jon Walker totally knows his way around a camera, right?

Okay, so maybe Ryan doesn't mind hearing about his boyfriend's talent with a camera; on that, at least, he is in complete agreement with everyone else. He just really wishes that he maybe wouldn't end up on the wrong side of the lens quite so often, especially when Jon has an assignment due (since those seem to lead to the displaying of Jon's work), and he says things like, "Listen, could you just--?"

_Especially_ when he has that look on his face which totally renders Ryan completely incapable of saying no.

Or how one night when Jon's over at Ryan's apartment studying, he follows Ryan into the kitchen when they go to get refills of drinks, snacks. He pushes Ryan back against the fridge, pinning his wrists against the closed door, the poetry magnets digging lightly into Ryan's back. He looks at Ryan's lips, licks at his own, and then he leans forward, kissing him, slowly, deeply, until Nate comes into the room and says, "Jeez, Ross, you have a room for a reason, you know?"

How Jon keeps his hand wrapped around Ryan's wrist as he pulls back, laughing, and says, "Yeah, you do, don't you?"

Or how one afternoon Jon says, "I think I'd like Vegas," as he sits down next to where Ryan's curled up on the sofa, buried up to his elbows underneath a blanket. When Ryan turns to look at him, though, Jon is in the process of kicking his shoes off--sneakers today, thin socks, his unwilling concession to the snow on the ground. He wiggles his toes. "I could wear flip-flops all year round. Fucking heaven, dude. _Heaven_."

Ryan doesn't say anything, just raises an eyebrow.

"I mean," Jon continues, apparently warming to his subject, "_here_ I can wear, like, eighty gazillion layers and my toes still get cold. I'd totally die of hypothermia or something if I even _thought_ about wearing flip-flops. In Vegas I'd--"

"Get a sunburn on the tops of your feet?" Ryan asks, but when Jon pouts at him, he sighs heavily, so very put upon, and lifts up the edge of the blanket. Jon's grin is instantaneous and Ryan feels his own smile widen as Jon curls closer. Until Jon traces the tip of his, yes, _very cold toe_ along the bottom of Ryan's foot, that is.

Jon's laugh when Ryan thwaps him lightly with the book he's reading is sharp and joyful, and he doesn't try very hard to get away.

Or how Jon records _Project Runway_ for Ryan on his and Tom's DVR, and how Ryan's taken to keeping a bag of Jon's favorite coffee in the kitchen cupboard.

Or how Jon's spent enough time in _Myopic Books_ with Ryan that Lenny, the store cat, actually comes to greet them when they come in the front door, meowing his 'hello, where have you been?'s, then following them around.

Or how one day when Jon says, "When we get a cat, I want to name it Dylan," Ryan just grins, says, "Well when we get a beagle, we're going to name it Hobo." Easy words, like this is going to be something more than a story with a set ending; like it's going to be forever.

*

So, it's a story. A college story, four years, the end. Ryan knows it, Jon knows it.

Except, two weeks before Ryan heads back to Las Vegas for Christmas, Jon is sitting at Ryan's dining room table. There is nothing unusual about that, because if Jon isn't at Ryan's in the evenings, Ryan is usually at Jon's. Tonight, though, Jon--normally so ready with an easy smile, a story from one of his classes to make Ryan laugh, a description of this new place he's found to take awesome pictures at, just awesome--is being quiet.

He's being quiet and is looking through Ryan's application to UNLV's creative writing MFA program, flipping through the pages slowly, even though they're stories that he's already read. He's tapping his fingers on the tabletop in an uneven rhythm, stuttered. Ryan hears him take a deep breath, then another shallower one, and then Jon looks Ryan right in the eye as he says, "So, um, you really aren't going to apply here?" Then, "If you stayed, we could get an apartment together next year."

And this, this is not how the story is supposed to go.

Ryan stares at him for a moment, a long one, then starts, "I--"

Jon interrupts him before he can say more, though. "We could do the whole starving artist thing, you know?" He laughs then, like he's joking, but there's enough of an edge to it that Ryan knows he's not.

He tries again: "I--" but Jon is still grinning, still trying to make a joke of it. Since Ryan still doesn't know what to say in response, he laughs along, too.

*

The thing is, it doesn't end there.

Oh, Jon doesn't mention the idea again, doesn't ask Ryan to stay, but…

They see the couch in some chic little shop in downtown Chicago. Ryan doesn't register a name, just the oblong sign done in bright orange with yellow letters. There's an umlaut in there somewhere, and if Ryan had been shopping by himself, he probably would have passed the store completely by.

Jon, however, is a window shopper. He likes to wander, peering in each and every shop window they pass. Sometimes he makes comments about the merchandise. Sometimes he makes snide remarks about the layout. He doesn't drag Ryan into stores to take a closer look at something very often, but this is one of the times that he does so, pinching the sleeve of Ryan's coat between his gloved fingers, laughing as Ryan grumbles at Jon for making him stumble over the threshold. As the door closes behind them, bells jingling, the salesgirl says hello.

"Can I help you?" she asks, and Ryan looks to Jon, unsure of why they're even in there.

Jon just smiles widely, pulling his gloves off, and points at the couch--lime green, overstuffed, decorated with throw pillows with _tassels_ along the edges."We just wanted to take a look at that. We--_I'm_ going to be needing a new apartment this summer and my roommate owns our couch."

The girl nods and makes a gesture, inviting them to sit down. Jon wraps his hand around Ryan's wrist and pulls him close. Then Jon flops onto the cushions. Ryan rolls his eyes at the look of ecstasy on Jon's face, then obligingly sits down beside him when Jon pats the space next to him. Now it's Jon's turn to laugh at Ryan's bliss. Ryan can feel Jon's breath puffing lightly against his cheek.

The couch is soft enough that he sinks into it, right against Jon's side. Jon's arm comes around Ryan's shoulders, and when Ryan closes his eyes, he finds it easy to forget that they're sitting in a store window, people walking by on the street outside, looking in. It's easy to imagine that they're in an apartment of their own, embracing the starving artist lifestyle, together.

It's easy, so easy, and then Ryan opens his eyes again.

*

Christmas comes and even though Jon's mother invites Ryan to spend the holiday with them (as do Pete and Ashlee), he heads back to Vegas, back home.

It's too hot when he steps off the plane, the dry air immediately sapping all of the moisture from his skin. Spencer and Brendon are waiting at the baggage claim for him, though, and he leans into their hugs a little bit more than he means to. Brendon starts talking the minute he lets go of Ryan and is still going when they make it to Spencer's car. He's the one to ask, "How's Jon Walker, Ryan? When are you going to bring him home to meet us? Huh? Huh?"

"Jon's good," Ryan says. He thinks, Jon wants me to stay. He thinks, Jon wants me to stay in Chicago permanently. He thinks, what would you say to that?

"Good!" Brendon says, like he knows Jon at all, like he truly cares about Jon's wellbeing. Spencer's looking at Ryan out of the corner of his eye, though, like he knows that something is going on, even if Ryan's trying to pretend that it's not.

Indeed, approximately five minutes after they drop Brendon off for the night, Spencer pulls into a Port O' Subs parking lot, puts the car in park and says, "Tell me."

Ryan debates continuing to play dumb for a whole second, but then Spencer sets his mouth into his patented stubborn look, one which Ryan's not sure that he's _ever_ triumphed over, and so he sighs.

"Jon asked me to stay," Ryan says slowly, feeling the words on his tongue; it's the first time he's actually said them out loud. "After we graduate. He suggested that I go for my MFA there. That we get an apartment there."

Spencer's silent for longer than Ryan would like, but he finally prompts, "And?"

"And so this was never going to last beyond college," Ryan says, and it's true.

He might have stopped wondering when Jon was going to realize that Ryan was not the person he'd originally thought him to be. He might have even decided that Jon liked being with the Ryan that Ryan really was. But he'd always been planning to head back to Vegas after he was done with his degree; Jon has always known that, thus the reason that he hadn't expected the twist in this story.

"Why?" Spencer asks. "Why was it never going to last?"

"Because I'm coming back here," Ryan says, like it should be obvious, because it should be. It's _the plan_, his and Spencer's, and that is that. "Because we're getting that apartment, because I'm going to go to UNLV."

"You're an idiot," Spencer says, and Ryan feels just a little bit like he's been slapped.

"You and Jon," Spencer continues, then stops, swallowing. "You laugh when you tell me stories about him, Ryan. I know about what his teachers did in class this week, about how he dragged you into alleyways when he did that series of dumpster shots. You've told me how random people on campus have recognized you through his photographs and I know that in the one of you that he sent to me--oh, I didn't tell you that?--you were smiling. Really smiling."

Ryan opens his mouth to say something, anything, even if he doesn't know what yet, but Spencer continues before he can. "So maybe we should change the plan. Maybe I should think about moving to Chicago. I bet Brendon would be down with that."

"I--" Ryan starts again, and his chest is hurting just a little bit, his heart pounding too hard. His breath keeps catching in his throat, because it's too much.

It's too much.

He may not have been counting down to the end of him and Jon, will admit that he hasn't wanted to, that he's consciously not been looking at his calendar so that he won't see the days pass, but there's always been an expiration date. Always. It was always going to _end_.

It's something entirely different, scary, to consider that the end might not be only a few months away.

"Breathe," Spencer says, and his hand is soft against Ryan's back. "Breathe."

It takes a moment, but Ryan does.

*

So, when Ryan tells the story, this is what he says: Everything begins with a dream of leaving Vegas, a chance meeting with Pete Wentz at the summer orientation. It begins with a photograph, a meeting, an unwilling smile.

The story ends, though, with a letter. It ends here:

The mail arrives at 3 o'clock. Ryan is waiting.

He opens the letter, hands shaking, at 3:02. He shows up on Jon's doorstep at 4:34, punching the doorbell three times in the admittedly short amount of time it takes for Jon to buzz him up.

Jon grins when he opens the door, says, "I thought we were meeting at the library at seven?"

Ryan just holds out the letter. The top edge of the envelope is ragged where Ryan tore at it, and the whole thing is creased down the middle from where Ryan had it shoved in his pocket. Jon takes it slowly, frowning, then carefully pulls out the letter.

His eyes widen as he reads the first line. _Congratulations, Mr. Ross. We are pleased to tell you that you have been accepted into--_

"It's not University of Chicago," Ryan says. "Spencer, um. He talked sense into me about two weeks too late, but it's, uh, here. It's in Chicago."

The Chicago School of the Arts. Ryan thinks, slightly hysterically, that they really will be two starving artists. "We could get that apartment," he continues a moment later, when Jon still hasn't said anything, hasn't done anything more than look back and forth between Ryan and the letter. "And, um, that couch, you know the one. It's still there, I went to look. We could--we could buy it, together."

Then, because Jon _still_ hasn't said anything. "If, um, your offer to stay is still open?"

His heart's pounding too hard, and he's trying to figure out if there's a way that he could say 'ha ha, just kidding,' sort of like Jon had done, that one night. But then, between one heartbeat and the next, Jon is wrapped around Ryan, his face pressed to Ryan's neck, lips brushing kisses there. He pulls back and kisses Ryan's cheek, chin, nose, then finally his mouth: hard, desperate.

They're both breathless when Jon finally pulls back, and Ryan knows he's grinning stupidly. It doesn't even fade when Jon says, "You're sure? You're really sure? Spencer's not going to kick my ass for keeping you from Vegas?"

Ryan shakes his head. He'll mention Spencer's thoughts of moving to Chicago at a later time.

He looks beyond Jon then, more fully into the apartment, and then he squints, because on Jon's coffee table he sees-- Is that--?

"Is that--?" he asks, and Jon actually blushes a little bit, but he doesn't stop Ryan from walking across the room, picking it up. He turns to Jon, an eyebrow raised, holds the travel guide up.

"I told you," Jon says. "I thought that I might like living in Vegas. It would just be a bonus if I could wear flip-flops all year 'round."

"But Chicago's home," Ryan says, because it's true. It is.

"It will be," Jon says, and this time, Ryan's the one to kiss him.

And that is where the story ends.


End file.
